The entity component model does not necessarily mean, that it's an actual 3D model. For more about what an entity component model is, see this blog post:
http://piemaster.net/2011/07/entity-component-primer/
I think the best way to go to communicate between components is a messaging system which allows the component to "talk" with its parent entity, like MyEntity.SendMessage('Heya, all my little component') or MyEntity.SendMessage('Hi, specific component', ComponentInstance) and from the component side something along like MyComponent.DidReceiveMessage('Heya, all my little components'). This is how I implemented it already and it is very similar to how this is handled in Unity3D.
Because you don't really know which components your entity has, I think sending messages is the best way, even though it may impact the performance a bit.
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